Tuesday, September 27, 2011

The Boy Mir: Struggle as the West’s war fails

() Following the international hit "The Boy who Plays on the Buddhas of Bamiyan," THE BOY MIR covers not one year but ten. It tracks the cheeky, enthusiastic Mir from a childish eight to a fully grown 18-year-old, a journey to adulthood in one of the toughest places on Earth, a journey that mirrors the story of Afghanistan.
The Boy Mir: One boy’s struggle and the failure of the West’s war [on Afghanistan]
Socialistworker.co.uk/Art
John Clossick thinks that The Boy Mir offers a stunning account of the trials of life in Afghanistan.

Six months before 9/11, shocking media images appeared of the Taliban government dynamiting the 1,450-year-old Buddha statues at Bamiyan in central Afghanistan. The demolition in March 2001 followed a Taliban edict that all statues be destroyed.

It brought the regime’s determination to impose a severe interpretation of Islam on Afghanistan into sharp international focus. The act shocked the West, although previously there had been little interest in the disastrous effects of a Western economic blockade on the country.

No one had commented much on the thousands of children who suffered from malnutrition as a result or were maimed by land mines. The visual shock of this destruction is both the starting point and the counterpoint for this affecting and strikingly shot documentary. More

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